Bus Driver Fired For Harassing Special-Needs Children

By Jacy Wojcik in News on May 1, 2008 8:44PM

A bus driver and bus aide were suspended for harassing special needs children in the Morton School District 201 after a recording surfaced of the pair calling kids "f[uck]ing little monsters," threatening to tie the children on the roof and also threatening to break their fingers. Cathy and Richard Bedard had a feeling something wasn't right with the bus that took 2 of their 3 special needs kids to school everyday so they stuck a tape recorder in their 13 year-old daughter's backpack. Sneaky. Awesome. The driver and aide work for First Student Inc. and were immediately suspended, however, the school district recently learned that following a 6-week suspension the pair were reassigned to another route, causing outrage in the community.

First Student states the pair were taken off their new routes and fired last week after they finally received a copy of the tape. Whether the driver and aide will be criminally charged is still up in the air—the recording might violate the state's eavesdropping law and the children may not even be able to testify against the two making it difficult to prosecute.

School district spokesman Dan Proft said, "Part of the outrage is that these are children who cannot functionally verbally communicate." [S-T, TRIB, photo by matrixchic]